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The Best Light Pink Paint Color For Nursery Walls

Alternate title: Breaking Out John’s Painting Belt

It was like old times. For those who don’t get the painting belt reference, check this out for further explanation. Anyway, as we mentioned yesterday, we painted Clara’s nursery. And instead of cloning the exact space that she enjoyed in our old house, we took the move as an opportunity to switch up the wall color. We figure since we’re working with the same furniture and even the same light fixture and curtains (since I was too sentimental to leave them behind) we thought a new wall color would make things feel a little fresher- like the room is subtly evolving over time as opposed to being totally reinvented (since many of the major pieces are staying the same) or a carbon copy of the last room (just because we’ve been there and done that).

When we were chatting about what colors we could do, we debated a few options: some shade of blue (but we thought it would be too much with the blue bedding, changing pad cover, capiz chandelier, and the blue in the curtain fabric), some shade of green (too similar to the past version), some shade of yellow (not present in the curtains or any other items already in the room so probably too random), some neutral color (too safe for a kids room, we wanted to have some fun), some shade of pink (hmm, but is that super girly? we’re scared). And guess what we went with?!

Girl Paint Baby Pink

Since there were soft tones of pink in the curtains as well as in our DIY mobiles (that we have yet to hang) we thought it would fit in nicely – as long as we kept things on the subtle side so it didn’t get too bright and overwhelming. But we didn’t just want a soft ballet pink (or a baby pink like the swatch in the photo above). We wanted something with gray/lavender undertones. It’s hard to explain, so we’ll let the swatch cards do the talking:

Nursery Paint Chips

See how the one with the arrow towards it seems grayer and more lavender than the others? We thought it had a nice muddy sophistication and hoped that it wouldn’t look too pastel-ish and girly, since we’ve always loved that Clara’s room is full of greens and blues and other non-gender specific colors. Not to say that the room isn’t clearly a girl’s room now, but we just wanted the color to have a bit more dimension than just a soft pink. Plus you might remember this whole-house-color-scheme post, where the second swatch on the top row was a little bit pink, a little bit gray, and a little bit lavender. That was what we were going for.

And in person it really does look dimensional and full of subtle gray and lavender undertones! The color is from Benjamin Moore’s Affinity line and it’s called Proposal (sweet, right?) but you know we’re too cheap to get BM paint for the most part, so we had it color matched to Olympic’s No-VOC paint at Lowe’s (which now not only has no-VOCs in the base paint, it also has no-VOCs in the colorants that they add, so it’s perfect for a nursery). Thankfully, we love how it turned out. It’s a hard color to capture in photos though (the subtleties and varied undertones aren’t always super apparent) but we did our best. Here’s the room before:

Nursery Unpainted

Nursery Unpainted2

Nursery Unpainted3

Here’s the room during painting (just so you can see our process, we pushed the big pieces into the center of the room and tossed a plastic tarp over them):

Nursery Painted1

And here’s the room now:

Nursery Painted2

Nursery Painted3

Of course it’ll look a lot more finished (and less pink-washed) when we hang the art, shelves, curtains, mobiles, etc. And when we switch out the ceiling fan for the blue capiz chandelier it’ll hopefully feel nice and complete for the beanette. And now for an obligatory look-how-cute-my-kid-is photo of Clara sleeping on her daddy. Is there anything sweeter?

Nursery Sleeping Clara

But back to her freshly painted nursery. Her room was always the priority for us because we’d like her to feel settled and we want her room to always be a place where we can escape the chaos of the rest of the house (especially since most of it will be “in-progress” for a loooong time). So stay tuned for pics when we get our act together and hang everything up in there for a more finished look. Until then you can find us staring at about thirty swatches on the wall in the living room…

Comments

  1. claire says

    i love the soft color. it definitely will make for a great escape. and it’s absolutely adorable that the color is actually named baby pink :)

    inspiringpretty.blogspot.com

    Reply

  6. Coutney says

    Way to go! I am not a fan of all that pink girly stuff, but you hit the nail on the head with the grey/purple undertones. We also used Olympic paint in our bedroom…Ash Mist. It is very subtle and we were worried that maybe it wasn’t enough color, but we went with it in an effort to make everything “lighter” in this new home and hey, it looks great! We love it.
    Yay for no vocs!

    Reply

  7. Kayakgirl73 says

    Looking forward to seeing it done. I like how your showing that the same furniture and acessories can evolve to fit growing kids and different homes.

    Reply

  9. Amy says

    *Sigh* That last photo. Is there anything sweeter? My son just turned 1 and doesn’t sleep on either of us much now (unless he’s sick). I miss it.

    Reply

  10. Ashley S says

    I like that you chose something not too girly. My husband and I have tried to avoid the “baby blue” in the same way for our son’s room. Do you think you would ever go for something less subtle, or are you planning to keep things toned down in Clara’s room? My husband and I wanted something fun and exciting for our nursery and guest room (as well as gender neutral, in case our next child is a girl). We went with Behr’s “Pepper Grass” for his room and “Bird of Paradise” for the guest room. I love how bright and cheery the colors are during the daytime, but somehow warm and inviting at night.

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Hey Ashley,

      We definitely would be open to something less subtle down the road (we’re pretty sure when Clara’s old enough to pick her own paint colors they might just blow us away- but we want her to have that “artistic freedom” to do something crazy if she wants to). Your colors sound gorgeous since they’re bold but not too dark at night- that’s totally the jackpot.

      xo,
      s

  12. Rebecca @ the lil house that could says

    I love that you completely changed the wall color this time around! I was secretly expecting a blue or green when you mentioned it yesterday. It’s almost a neutral pink (who knew there was such a thing!), so it can definitely grow with her with a little change of accessories!

    Reply

  16. Cassie says

    Beautiful choice! Clara’s nursery looks at though it feels sweet and serene already. I have to say, I like it more that the last color scheme. Maybe a soft yellow on the ceiling?

    Good luck with the living room!

    Reply

  19. Lisa says

    Absolutely gorgeous (the room and the beanette). Good work! How is the unpacking coming? I’d love to see how things look 1 week after the initial “house full of boxes” photo post.

    Reply

  21. r8chel says

    Very nice! I tend to avoid pink, but Clara’s room looks so soft, sweet, and lovely. And as always, I’m impressed with how much warmer and cozier the room looks now that the walls aren’t a stark white.

    Reply

  23. Lyndsay M says

    I’m not usually a lover of pinks, but this is a beautiful color! Where did you get those larger paint samples that are in the top part of your doorway? I seem to always only be able to find the little ones you have below.

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      It just depends on the brand when it comes to swatch size- the bigger ones are Benjamin Moore swatches from the Affinity line and the Ralph Lauren line (while the ones with multiple squares per strip are also Benjamin Moore, but from the regular line). Hope it helps!

      xo,
      s

    • YoungHouseLove says

      We actually were going to paint the ceiling the same subtle color but on the ceiling it looked super dark (different planes can make paint a lot darker or lighter) so we opted not to. Perhaps in the future we’ll get a much lighter shade for the ceiling so it doesn’t look too dark. We also want to add crown molding down the line…

      xo,
      s

  25. Michelle says

    Cute room!

    We recently used Olympic’s no-VOC paint and it seemed really “thin”, compared to the Sherwin Williams paints we have used in the past. It did cover in 2 coats but we definitely needed the second. Have you guys noticed this or did we just get a bad can? (We stirred it well, etc)

    Reply

  26. Vicki says

    I LOVE the color! It’s perfectly sweet. I am just always amazed (and a little freaked out) about how much more saturated colors look on the wall vs. on a swatch. It has caused us to repaint a LOT in our new house.

    Reply

  29. Sassy Mommy says

    Love it! I understand your need to paint and move into things quickly. When we moved into our house we were so excited we unpacked all night. Then a month later when we found out I was preggers we started painting (me with mask of course) so everyone could feel settled- especially little man. Great job!

    Reply

  30. Laura says

    I guessed the color was from Glidden due to the size and shape of the paint chip, but I was wrong.
    Love the new color choice!
    Can’t wait to see what colors you choose for the rest of the house.

    Reply

  32. Jennifer says

    I was selfishly hoping you’d do anything BUT pink. We are planning a nersery now, but it’s staying gender-neutral, so pink probably wouldn’t be a good choice for us. Looks like we’ll stick with green!

    I will be excited to see what it looks like all set up.

    Reply

  33. Lauren says

    I love the pink! It’s definitely more girly, but not over the top. I know you said you don’t want to completely copy her old room, but are you going to recreate the asymmetrical art collage? I loved that in your old house!

    Reply

  36. Amanda says

    It looks great … though I did like the greens/blues in the last nursery! But I love the grayish in the pink. And I can’t wait to see it with the curtains :)

    Reply

  38. Kristina says

    That’s a brilliant shade of pink! I wanted to paint my little girl’s room a very subtle pink but I was vetoed by my husband. Sigh. We went with an avocado green. Which meant I was able to accent with much bolder shades of pink. So who won in the end?

    Reply

  40. Rabbit says

    LOVE that color! Very feminine, but not too girly…if that makes sense. More STRONG woman vs. girly girl.

    Anywhoo, which direction do the windows in Clara’s room face? I’m doing a teeny little room over for crafty stuff, and want to have fun with color, but not have it be too crazy. I might check this out–but the room I have has one window, which faces north, and we all know northern light is cold. Thanks in advance!

    Reply

  41. brandt @ New House on the Blog says

    Notice John grew his stubble out to offset the fact that he’s painting a pink room…a man’s man through and through!

    Great job guys. I really do like the pink, especially for a little girl’s room. We’ve actually been through 3 different houses that have pink rooms, and they always go either way too bold, or way too light. Looks like you found a nice combination.

    Reply

  42. Amy says

    quick question do you guys still have plaster walls then from your previous comment or were you talking about the old house’s walls?

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Hey Amy,

      Both houses have plaster walls (50’s/60’s ranches usually do, so we expected it). We’re actually used to them by now so it’s not a big deal.

      xo,
      s

  43. Micha says

    Hats off for daring to use pink as a wall color :o) It looks great but being a tomboy kind of gal myself and surrounded by men only (except for our menagery)I must admit I’m still madly in love with Clara’s old nursery color scheme. I know, shame on me :o)

    Reply

  45. Laura says

    I love pink rooms! I am looking forward to seeing this room completely done because I love pink walls but I find it really difficult to do pink without it looking too cotton candy. I may copy your colour when I get around to stripping all the wallpaper in my daughter’s room!

    Reply

  46. Amanda says

    Sorry to comment again.

    I noticed you took down your “post card” shelves in the old office/everything-else-it-was, and was wondering if you were planning on using them again in this house?

    Reply

  49. Amy says

    I love a good project and since our home is finished and we’re not moving anytime soon I’ll have to live vicariously through you two! Great job on Clara’s room so far. We chose a blue-ish gray for our daughter’s room but we did a lot of pink in the accessories. Keep up the great work!

    Reply

  50. S says

    I had no idea you could color-match BM paints to no-VOC options. That’s great to know! Also, I love the color…I bet the tones vary depending on the time of day.

    Reply

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